Chairman of the Barbados Port Authority Lisa Cummins and Minister responsible Kirk Humphrey have had a lot to say about the haphazardly implemented upgrade to the ASYCUDA World system – the acronym translates to Automated Systems for Customs Data a computerized system designed by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) to administer a country’s customs. Although they have assuaged public concerns something still stinks in Denmark.
A consequence of the poor implementation by government- if we accept public comment- is that the release of inbound shipments have been delayed for weeks, some say months since ASYCUDA went live in September 2018. The blogmaster has not posted on this issue before because of the lack of information about what is a technical issue.
We have had cursory commentary on BU about why would the government not run the old system in parallel. So far we have not been made aware of anyone or agency being held accountability for the foul up. What cannot be disputed is that the haphazard implementation of ASYCUDA has had a negative financial impact for the country.
It was brought to the attention of the blogmaster by a BU family member that by clicking on the ASYCUDA link- https://asycuda.customs.gov.bb/index.jsf and dare click on “Upload e-manifest” under the “ONLINE SERVICES” menu on the top-left side of the window. You’ll be greeted with a “404 — The requested page was not found.” message. To the blogmaster’s simple way of thinking, if the link is suppose to work it should not generate an error. The obvious question pops up – was change management done by our high paid officials?
Hoping the BU intelligentsia weighs in on the matter.
The blogmaster invites you to join the discussion.